The Lake Erie Monsters made their way down to the Lone Star State last week for two back to back contest against the San AntonioRampage. Thursday night the two teams took the ice to face off against each other for the third time this season. Lake Erie was first to get on the score sheet when Dean Strong capitalized on the power play for the Monsters late in the opening period. Lake Erie’s power play unit struck again early on in the second period. This time Paul Carey put the puck past Jacob Markström to make the score 2-0. Just 10 seconds later, former Rampage forward Bill Thomas increased the Monster’s lead once again with his 12th goal of the season. Lake Erie held their 3-0 lead until early in the third when Jon Sim was able to finally figure out how to get a shot past Calvin Pickard. Andrew Agozzino restored the three goal lead for the Monsters minutes later, and Bill Thomas netted his second goal of the evening shorthanded to seal the Monster’s 5-1 victory with about six minutes of play remaining.

Hoping for different results when the two teams face-off against once another the next night, the Rampage were first on the board first. Casey Wellman assisted on James Wright‘s goal midway though the opening period. A few moments later, Jon Rheault added an unassisted goal on the power play to give San Antonio a 2-0 lead heading into the second period. Lake Erie countered with two goals of their own in he opening minutes of the second to make for a tie game heading into the final 20 minutes of play. Early in the third, Wellman and Nolan Yonkman set up Drew Shore for the tie-breaking goal. Rheault added his second goal of the evening a couple minutes later to secure the 4-2 win for the silver and black.

Saturday the Rampage headed up to Austin for a game against the Texas Stars. The first goal came six minutes into the tilt when Robak and Yonkman set up Shore for his 10th goal of the season. During the final minute of play in the first, Alex Chiasson added a goal for Texas and tied the game heading into the first intermission. The Stars scored the lone second period goal and added another in the third to win the game 3-1.

Following Saturday’s game against the Stars, Drew Shore, Quinton Howden , Jon Rheault, James Wright, Alex Petrovic, Mike Caruso and Jacob Markström received word that they’d be heading to South Florida in the morning for Panthers Training Camp.

The San Antonio Rampage (16-20-0-4) currently sit in 14th place in the AHL’s Western Conference with 36 points. The Oklahoma City Barons are on deck for the Rampage. San Antonio will travel to face the Barons at the Cox Convention Center Friday and Saturday Nights.

As always, thanks for reading and feel free to leave comments below or on our Facebook Fan Page! And a special congrats to the 7 players called up to the NHL! Best of luck to them all!

After snapping out of an eight game win-less streak with wins against Rochester and Lake Erie the San Antonio Rampage started their week with two games against the Abbotsford Heat in British Columbia. The teams hit the ice Tuesday night and it didn’t take long for Casey Wellman to open the scoring for the Rampage in the opening minutes of the period. Jon Rheault received the first penalty of the game, and the Heat were able to capitalize on the power play to even the score six minutes into the contest. The Rampage regained the lead before the first period ended when Colby Robak set up Greg Rallo to give San Antonio the 2-1 lead heading into the first intermission. Abbotsford’s Max Reinhart recorded his first goal of the season to tie the game back up midway through the game. Solid goalkeeping by both Jacob Markström and Heat goalie Barry Brust kept the game tied at two until the end of regulation and sent the two teams into overtime. The Rampage didn’t need much extra time to find the back of the net once the overtime period started. Jason DeSantis netted his first goal as a member of the silver and black which was also the game winning goal after just 35 seconds of extra time.

The two teams were back at it 24 hours later at the Abbotsford Sports and Entertainment Centre. Rampage forward Scott Timmins started off the scoring for the night with his third goal of the ’12-’13 season early in the first. A few minutes later, Jared Gomes and Jonathan Hazen collected assists on Justin Vaive‘s first goal of the year. Timmins set up Quinton Howden for the Rampage’s third goal of the night to give them a 3-0 lead heading into the final period of play. With less than two minutes to play, and the Heat net empty, Timmins and Rampage Captain Nolan Yonkman were able to help Howden seal the victory and make the final score 4-0. Markström stopped all 36 shots that were fired at him, and the Rampage headed back to the States with an Abbotsford Heat sweep and 4 more points for the standings. [Read more…]

It was a hockey filled weekend in San Antonio with games all three nights. The post-Thanksgiving weekend kicked off with a match-up against the Houston Aeros on Friday Night. Jacob Markström and Aeros goaltender Matt Hackett stopped all the shots that were fired at them until 25 seconds into the second period when Jason Zucker netted his eighth goal of the season for Houston. The Aeros maintained a 1-0 lead until 13:16 of the third when Scott Timmins scored his second of the season to even the score at one. With just under three minutes to go in the game, Justin Fontaine capitalized on the Aeros power play to give Houston the 2-1 victory.

Saturday night the Rampage found themselves down 1-0 at the end of the first period against the Abbotsford Heat. The goal came on an Abbotsford power play with Rampage captain Nolan Yonkman in the box for elbowing and fighting. The Rampage regrouped during intermission and after 16 minutes of play Casey Wellman and Jason DeSantis set up James Wright to end Barry Brust’s AHL recording breaking shutout streak and make it rain teddy bears inside the AT&T Center as part of the annual “Teddy Bear Toss” Night benefiting Toys for Tots. After almost a 10 minute delay to pick up all the bears, game play resumed and shortly after Wright and Wellman set up Quinton Howden for the second Rampage goal of the night. San Antonio protected their 2-1 lead until the final 15 seconds when Brett Olson tied the game for Abbotsford and sent the two teams to overtime. After a scoreless overtime period, Abbotsford and San Antonio headed to a shootout. It would take 11 rounds to settle it. Jon Rheault shot first for the Silver and Black and scored, but the rest of the San Antonio shooters were stopped until James Wright found the back of the net 6 rounds later. Unfortunately those two goals wouldn’t be enough to match Abbotsford’s three and the Heat burned the Rampage with a final score of 3-2.

Rheault-vember continued Sunday evening for the Rampage with Jon Rheault tallying his 6th goal of the season and of the month at the 8:36 mark of the opening period. Travis Morin spoiled the Rampage’s lead with a goal later in the period and sent the two teams to the dressing rooms tied with one goal a piece. Midway though the game, Colby Robak and Rheault assisted on a Drew Shore goal to reestablish the Rampage’s lead once again. That lead was erased quickly when the Texas Stars scored put two goals up on the scoreboard just 27 seconds apart. The Rampage cut the Stars’ lead in half when Shore found the back of the next again with just over 6 minutes left to play in the game. But just as the gap was closing between the two teams, the Stars found a way to open it back up with a goal less than a minute later to make the score 4-3 and added an empty net goal with less than a minute remaining to extend their lead to 5-3, which would be the final score. [Read more…]

Rampage Forwards Scott Timmins, David Marshall and Wacey Rabbit talk between plays in Rochester, NY last season (Photo by Amanda Land).

Training Camp kicked off this morning at the Northwoods Ice Center in San Antonio as 35 players took the ice to begin preparations for the upcoming season. 20 forwards, 11 defensemen and four goaltenders will be competing for a spot on the opening night roster over the next week. I figured for today’s post I’d write a bit about a few of the forwards I’m excited to watch this season, so here we go:

The New:Jean-Francois Jacques– Maybe it’s because of the extremely french name, but for some reason my attention has always gravitated to him whenever he’s on the ice in front of me. Originally selected by the Edmonton Oilers in the 2nd round (68th overall) in the 2003 NHL Entry Draft, the native of Montreal has both NHL and AHL experience. Last season with the Syracuse Crunch (Anaheim’s AHL affiliate), Jacques racked up 21 goals and added 19 assists and 95 penalty minutes in 65 regular season games. At 6’3″ and 231 lbs, he’s a big guy showed last year that he’s capable of scoring and dropping the gloves occasionally.

Jon Rheault-Signed on the first day of free agency this summer, I think Rheault will be a nice addition to the Rampage lineup. While with the Abbotsford Heat last year, Jon netted 16 goals and 17 assists in 47 games. In 2010 he finished second on Heat’s roster in the assists, points, and shots categories. Hopefully he’ll be able to continue to produce goals and assists down in San Antonio and help the silver and black on the score sheet after they lost a few key point gettters over the off-season.